


The Risks Involved

by taylor_tut



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Gen, Protective Avengers, Sick Character, Sick Tony Stark, Sickfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-17
Updated: 2018-05-17
Packaged: 2019-05-08 01:32:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,468
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14683644
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/taylor_tut/pseuds/taylor_tut
Summary: Tony tries to be responsible for once and phone in when he's not up to meeting with Fury and Steve. But when they need Iron Man, Steve has no choice but to beg him to come fight. Partially to shoehorn in a request from tumblr for the angsty line of dialogue "I don't believe in heaven."





	The Risks Involved

**Author's Note:**

> i can't title mY SHIT

Steve knocked three times on the door of Tony's workshop jovially. Overall, today had already been a fantastic day. From a productive day of CBT for Bucky which leftt him feeling more optimistic than he had in a while to a long jog with Sam Wilson, Steve was on cloud nine. 

"Hey, Tony," he called, "you in there?"

He smiled and rolled his eyes when he heard Tony groan like he'd been woken up--probably fell asleep at the workbench, he thought.

The smile fell when Tony opened the door.

"Cap," he greeted tiredly. "Shit, I meant to call. I don't think I'm gonna make the meeting with Fury."

Tony looked awful. His face was paler than Steve had ever seen it, and he was sweating, flushed a sickly pink and looking at him with dull eyes.

"Oh, wow," Steve startled, "you look miserable."

Tony shrugged. "Pretty sure it's a migraine."

Steve frowned. "Why are you sleeping down here in the lab?" he asked. "You should be in your bed."

"Nah," Tony denied, burying his face in the crook of his elbow which was propped against the doorframe, "window in my room. It's darker in here."

Steve nodded and stepped into the lab to lead Tony back to the couch, the door shutting behind him.

"If Fury's really gonna chew you a new asshole, I can drag myself to SHIELD--"

"Don't worry about that," Steve cut him off, "I'll deal with Fury. Do you need anything?" 

Tony made a dissenting noise, his eyes already buried in the couch arm. "Just need to sleep it off," he replied. 

It was pretty rare for Steve to see Tony ill enough to call out of an obligation. Sure, he'd whine about how much he didn't want to meet with Fury, or about how many better things he could be doing, or any number of excuses, but he really never got sick enough to skip something entirely.

"Are you sure it's just a migraine?" Steve asked, wanting to press a hand to Tony's forehead but unable to do so with his face in the chushions. 

"Feels like it," Tony replied. "It even hurts to move my neck." 

"That's rough," Steve sympathized. He hadn't had a headache since the serum, but he remembered just how bad they could get. "Painkillers?"

"Too late for that," Tony lamented, "I'd just throw them up." 

"Are you sure you're good here alone?" Steve asked, growing less confident that he should leave by the moment but knowing that SOMEONE had to meet with Fury and Tony was in no shape to do it.

"Mhmm," Tony replied, nearly asleep again. 

Steve nodded hesitantly. "Well, I'll be in the meeting," he said, "but I think Barton is staying in the SHIELD dorms, and Dr. Banner is always a phone call away. And, of course, if you really need me, just call Fury and I'll leave the meeting."

Tony gave a lazy and stiff thumbs up and Steve left, making sure he was covered with a blanket and that the lights were off before he went.

 

Steve was actually wrong to assume that Fury would be pissed about Tony missing the meeting. 

He raised an eyebrow suspiciously when Steve walked in alone.

"I thought I was meeting with both you and Stark," he said disapprovingly. 

Steve nodded. "We were," he agreed, "but Stark is down and out."

"Oh?" Fury asked. "How so?"

"He said he had a migraine," Steve admitted, "but he looked like he was coming down with something, too. He was too sick to even leave the couch of his workshop because the rest of the tower was too bright."

Nick whistled long and low. "Damn," he said empathetically. "Well, we can catch him up. There's nothing we specifically need him for--"

"--Fury, Sir?" an intern, young and timid, called from the doorway. Steve shuddered thinking about how terrifying it must be for this kid to work their first job with Nick Fury as their boss. "There's Flying Robots attacking Central Park."

"Well, fuck," Fury said, and Steve couldn't help but agree. 

The main problem with fighting the bots was that Thor was in Asgard. 

They needed the aerial advantage of someone who could fly, and right now, the only contender was Tony. Tony who was still holed up in his lab, wishing for death.

Steve hated having to ask.

 

"Boss," FRIDAY called quietly, "Captain Rogers has called the Avengers to assemble."

Tony frowned. "He knows I can't right now," he moaned. His headache had gotten nothing but worse and the stiffness in his neck was so bad that he could barely move it. 

"He said it's urgent," she said. "He apologized, but with Thor in Asgard--"

"Gotcha," Tony cut her off. He'd forgotten about that. Really, everything seemed pretty fuzzy in his mind right now, and he was starting to wonder if maybe Steve had been right about this not being just a migraine.

"I informed him that your temperature is nearly 103 degrees and that your heart rate is increased," she admitted, "but he said that there's not another choice. They can't win the battle without you, Boss," she said. "They've been trying for an hour."

Slowly, Tony forced himself up into a seated position, cringing when the movement jostled his head. Why the fuck was his nect so stiff? It was nauseatingly painful, and for a terrifying moment, he sat there, swallowing dangerously in an attept to keep the small amount of liquid he'd ingested that day down. This was gonna suck. 

 

"Iron Man is here," Natasha announced, her voice way too loud in Tony's ears. 

"FRIDAY," volume 50%," he said quietly.

"Sorry," Natasha apologized.

"You're seriously a life-saver, Stark," Clint said. It was pretty rare for him to thank Tony for anything, so they must've been totally boned without him. 

"How're you feeling?" Steve asked. Tony really, really didn't feel like talking. He felt muddled, confused; he knew he'd been asked a question but couldn't quite remember what it was even in just the span of time it had taken to try to reply. 

Apparently he'd been silent for longer than he thought, because when Peter prompted, "Iron Man? You good?" the kid sounded pretty freaked out.

"Just get this over with," Tony dodged. He landed next to where Clint and Peter were fighting, but the intertia of his flight took him off his feet and left him on his face. If not for the suit, he'd have taken a huge bite of New York City dirt. 

"Stark?" Clint called, his attention mostly on a bot but unable to ignore Tony's fall which he'd caught from the corner of his eye. Tony grunted. "Fuck, I REALLY don't think he should be out here, Rogers," he warned. "He can barely stand up."

"We don't need him standing," Steve said, "we just need him to fly up and wipe out the bot that's remote controlling the others. Can you do that?"

Tony was trying to focus on sitting back up without jostling his neck. God damn, there was no way it was supposed to hurt this much. Suddenly, someone was grabbing his hands and pulling him up--some nerdy-looking Red Blur. He thought he said thanks, but Peter didn't say anything back, so he probably didn't. Oh well, Tony decided; the fewer people talked to him right now, the better. 

"Avengers," FRIDAY cut in over the comms, "Boss' vitals are becoming concerning. His temperature has skyrocketed just since being here, and I believe he needs immediate medical attention."

"Ten minutes, FRI," Steve promised, "hear that, Tony? Ten minutes. You've done more in worse shape than this." 

Tony would argue that he was beginning to think he had never BEEN in worse shape than this, but he couldn't find the words to say it out loud.

"Feel really bad," Tony was the best he could come up with.

"I know," Clint said sympathetically, "we're gonna have medical standing by, okay? Right, FRIDAY?"

"On it," she agreed.

"Can you fly up there and wipe it out?" Steve asked again, gentler this time. 

"Dunno," Tony admitted. Everything hurt, and why was it so cold?

"As soon as that's done, you can go back to sleep," Steve promised, trying to keep his tone light despite the growing anxiety. "I won't even guilt you about not cleaning up."

"Can't see straight," Tony said, his words riding on a pinched breath. His vision was swimming, like he was trying to look through everything through a cloud of steam. 

Peter stepped forward. "You just fly up," he instructed. "I'll get on your back and aim for you. Just fire when I say so."

Tony didn't move away when Peter started to climb onto his back, so he took it as an acceptance of his plan. 

Tony launched straight up into the air, but when Peter took his arm to aim toward the bot, firing the blast that knocked the bot down pushed his head forward slightly, and Tony felt himself flicker twice before falling straight out of the sky with Peter attached.

"Mr. Stark!" Peter panicked, "Mr. Stark, Mr. Stark; wake up!" 

Steve looked up just in time to see Tony and Peter falling from the sky.

"Tony?!" he shouted, sprinting toward the pair as the rest of the robots began to collapse. 

Peter was still screeching, trying to get Tony to wake. "Karen! FRIDAY, do something!"

Before the AI could respond, Hulk grabbed both of them just before they plumeted into the ground.

"His temperature is nearing 105," FRIDAY fretted. 

Steve's heart sank. Tony wouldn't be in this situation if it weren't for him. As if to kick him while he's down, Tony opened his eyes as the Hulk put both Tony and Peter down on the ground gently. 

"M'I done? I wanna sleep," he moaned, vulnerable in a way he would never be in his right mind.

"Mr. Stark?" Peter asked in a quivering voice, looking like was watching a family member fight for his life, "105, FRIDAY, oh my God. What's wrong with him?"

"Cross scanning his symptoms with medical literature, bacterial meningitis would be on my shortlist," she replied. 

Peter pounded at the locks for Tony's faceplate and went to remove his own mask, but Tony tugged it back down over his chin. 

"Contagious," Tony explained blearily, "keep it on." 

Clint hit his knees next to them. "SHIELD's got an ambulance on the way," he promised, "they're trying to get around all the destruction from the bots. It could be up to ten minutes. The roads are really jacked up." Knowing that made sense didn't make it less shitty. 

Steve HATED feeling out of the loop. "Meningitis," he repeated, "what's that? How bad is it?"

Peter had gotten a whole lecture about it when he'd gotten his Menactra vaccine. 

"It's really serious," he said gravely, "it can kill people in, like, hours. People lose limbs and stuff, too.  How long has he been sick?"

Steve cursed. He'd KNOWN how unusual it was for Tony to take a day off. He'd known that if Tony were choosing to lie on the couch all day, that something had to be seriously wrong. He'd ignored it. He'd made him come out and fight a robot. 

"Since this morning, at least," Steve replied. 

"The arc reactor weakens the boss' heart," FRIDAY interjected, "and the limited blood flow could worsten septecemia. I advise taking off the gauntlets and boots to check for necrosis. 

"Alright, let's get you out of this tin can, huh?" Clint said, trying to keep the worry from his face as Tony studied him with eyes that were barely tracking. 

"Don't," Tony argued weakly, "s'gonna hurt." 

"Tough," Clint replied. "Go to your happy place."

"But not heaven," Peter added quickly before he could stop himself. 

Tony tried to roll his eyes, but the movement hurt. "I don't believe'n heaven," he replied, "n'sides, even if s'real, m'not goin'." 

"Yeah, hell does seem like it would be more the crowd you'd run with," Clint agreed. "But the only place you're going is the ER. Look," he gestured behind him to the paramedics that Steve was ushering toward him, but moving his head to look at it took him under the muddy waters of unconsciousness again.

 

When Tony woke up in the hospital, Nat and Clint were arguing, Steve was trying to shut them up, Bruce was sleeping in a chair, and Peter was working on homework.

He tried to sit up, but found that moving his neck still hurt like a bitch. 

"Morning, sunshine," Clint greeted softly. Peter popped out an earbud excitedly.

"Mr. Stark's awake?"

"How're you feeling?" Steve asked, helping Tony grab the bed remote and sit up, only to pale again.

"Oh, God, up is bad; down, down," he breathed, the headache temporarily taking his vision.

"The doctors said that might be a side effect of the spinal tap for a few days," Natasha warned. 

"You scared us, Mr. Stark," Peter said, sliding his chair closer to Tony's bed.

"Sorry 'bout that," he apologized. "Did I do something stupid? I honestly don't remember anything past telling Rogers I didn't want to meet with Fury."

Steve flushed bright pink. "There was an attack," he said, "and we needed Iron Man. I knew you were sick, but I begged you to come help, and when you showed--you were so much sicker than this morning."

"Did I save Manhattan, though?" Tony asked, a cheeky grin on his face.

"That's not the point!" Steve snapped, slamming his fist on the metal rail of the bed so that it shook with a loud, rattling clang. "I almost killed you," he added, much more quietly. 

Tony... didn't know what to say to that. 

"I've always known there's risks involved; we all know that--"

"--The risk is supposed to come from out there!" Steve near shouted, gesturing to space and everything lurking there. "Not from your team leader! Not from your friends!"

Tony looked down at his blanket-covered feet. 

That had woken Bruce up just in time to calm Steve down. "This is a hospital," he warned, "and Tony's still sick. I think you should stop yelling."

"Did I really almost die?" Tony asked, and Bruce nodded. 

"Yeah," he admitted, "you did."

"And, I... uh... did I..."

Peter rolled his eyes. "Yes, you killed the stupid robot leader," he informed, knowing exactly where Tony was going before he said the words.

"Well, that's good, at least," Tony offered. 

It was tense. Steve wasn't ready to forgive himself, everyone had watched their friend nearly die, and Tony's toes were still numb. 

"I think the pain meds reloaded," Tony announced, feeling his eyelids getting heavy once more.

"Sleep," Steve instructed. "We'll be here for you when you wake up."

  
  



End file.
